How It Happens and How to Avoid It: AdBlue in a Diesel Tank in Upton
AdBlue already in the diesel tank? In that case set this page aside a moment, keep your ignition and engine off, and call 0333 366 0103. Caught before your engine runs, it's generally a drain and a thorough flush, done where the car is around Upton. Nothing happened yet? Below, the page covers the why it occurs and the how to avoid it for good.
Why does AdBlue in a diesel vehicle need its own filler?
Many modern diesels on the roads round Upton and Hough Green carry two liquids, not one. Diesel goes to the motor. Stored in a tank of its own, AdBlue is fed into your exhaust stream to clean it.
Separate tanks, separate fillers. Some vehicles put the AdBlue filler in your boot or under the bonnet; plenty of others place the two side by side under one flap. Diesel goes in at every filling station visit, again and again. Someone who has to stop and work out where it goes usually tops up the AdBlue side, from a bottle, and far less often. That gap is where the mistake lives.
How AdBlue in your diesel tank takes place in Upton
Carelessness rarely causes it. Instead is three things lining up together.
On a drive off Hough Green Road before work, or in the car park outside The Sundowner heading home: that is where the rushed top-up happens. What is the reason for the rush? As AdBlue gets low the car tells you, and once it is gone, limp mode kicks in.
Then, your hand reaches for the cap it would have used on the old motor — because a hire car, a new motor or a company car puts the fillers somewhere your last one did not.
A spout-topped bottle finds no resistance at a diesel filler any more than at an AdBlue one. And so the tip, once started, keeps on. Whether it takes place in Cronton or the middle of Upton, it's the same few seconds.
Telling the AdBlue filler from your diesel filler
Check these before pouring, at a forecourt around Upton or a driveway over in Ditton. Seconds, that's all.
- Colour and lettering: an AdBlue cap is frequently blue, or says "AdBlue", where a diesel cap normally does not. Trust the cap, not its position.
- Many cars fit AdBlue the smaller neck of the two.
- A label inside the fuel flap frequently shows which fuel goes where, on many vehicles. Look for it.
- Cannot see it next to your diesel filler? Then look beneath the bonnet or in the boot — the handbook says which.
- The person who drove the vehicle last. On a hire or company car collected from somewhere like the car park at Hough Green, ask before you leave, not when the light comes on.
Keeping AdBlue out of your diesel tank when you top up
When the light comes on, wherever around Cheshire, follow this routine.
- Turn off after you park — level ground, motor off, and never rushed beside Danescroft on the verge.
- Locate the AdBlue filler, read the cap, and speak the name "AdBlue" aloud while you unscrew it. It sounds daft. It works.
- Leave the diesel cap on. If both sit under one flap, check your diesel cap is still closed before you lift the bottle.
- Gently does it, through the bottle's own spout, until it is full or the bottle is empty.
- Close the cap and check a second time. Make sure your diesel cap was never opened. Only then start your car.
Discover during the second or third step that AdBlue went into the diesel tank? That is where you stop. Leave out stage five altogether.
Upton: already put AdBlue in the diesel tank?
Then the order of things is short. Do not start your engine. Keep the ignition off as well, because on many diesels switching it on alone runs your fuel pump. Filling up with diesel will not thin it: instead, AdBlue sinks to the base of that tank, just where the fuel is taken from.
On a forecourt — Gulf, Shell or any other — the attendants will usually help roll the car away, if you ask. If you're on your own driveway around Upton, leave it where it is.
Already started? Pull over once it is safe, then turn off. The next junction is where to come off when you are on the M62, under 3 miles from Upton. Tell us roughly how far it went: a run towards Liverpool, under 10 miles away, is a bigger job than a short hop across Upton.
When our engineers turn up in Upton, what takes place?
The van reaches the car anywhere it stopped — your own driveway, beside Upton Community Centre, or outside All Saints Upton Church of England Voluntary Controlled Primary School. What fluid got in, the amount, and if it ran: our engineers ask since those answers set both work and price. The price comes over the phone, ahead of any van leaving.
After that: draining, then a thorough flush of the entire system. With AdBlue that matters more than with petrol: it crystallises and is corrosive to some of the metals in a fuel system, so it does not wash out on its own. The filter cleaned or, if needed, swapped; fresh diesel in; then a test of the vehicle. We don't go until it has been started and is running properly.
If the motor has not run, most jobs take about half an hour once we're there, using pumps that are fine on a working forecourt and quiet enough to use outside a house at night. You pay on the day, with nothing upfront, and get a VAT invoice and an engineer report for your insurer. Misfuelling cover is part of plenty of insurance policies — and so use the wait to look at yours.
About Upton itself
Upton is a suburban area in Cheshire, situated near the coast and approximately 8.8 miles from Liverpool. Upton has a relatively low elevation of around 25 metres above sea level, and its landscape is characteristic of the surrounding North West region. Upton is predominantly composed of terraced housing, which reflects the area's history of residential development. Upton is also close to nearby places such as Cronton and Ball o Ditton, and is part of the larger Liverpool urban area.
Upton and Cheshire: AdBlue drains across the area
As a residential suburb, Upton shares its vans surrounding areas — Ball o Ditton, Upton Rocks — right through WA postcodes and the surrounding area around them. The van reaches you fastest with a postcode starting WA8 4.
Moving the car isn't needed. Draining happens on the spot, be it a drive, a road near Saint Basil's Parish Centre, or a layby on the way to Hough Green Park. If you are close to a boundary, or somewhere hard to describe like the back of Saint Basil and All Saints Parish Church, ring and ask instead of guessing.
In short, for Upton drivers
Tip no AdBlue until you have read the cap. Still AdBlue in the diesel tank? Petrol in Diesel can empty it wherever it stands, wherever across Cheshire: keep it off then call 0333 366 0103.